Theannoyingknowitall > Theannoyingknowitall's Quotes

“What is truth? The negation of lies? Or the statement of a fact? And if the fact is a lie, what then is the truth?”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Sword of Destiny

“Why didn't you become a sorcerer, Geralt? Weren't you ever attracted by the Art? Be honest.'
'I will. I was.'
'Why, then, didn't you follow the voice of that attraction?'
'I decided it would be wiser to follow the voice of good sense.'
'Meaning?'
'Years of practice in the witcher's trade have taught me not to bite off more than I can chew. Do you know, Vilgefortz, I once knew a dwarf, who, as a child, dreamed of being an elf. What do you think; would he have become one had he followed the voice of attraction?”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Czas pogardy

“Hmm…’ Ciri bit her lower lip, then leaned over and put her eye closer to the hole. ‘Madam Yennefer is standing by a willow… She’s plucking leaves and playing with her star. She isn’t saying anything and isn’t even looking at Geralt… And Geralt’s standing beside her. He’s looking down and he’s saying something. No, he isn’t. Oh, he’s pulling a face… What a strange expression…’ ‘Childishly simple,’ said Dandelion, finding an apple in the grass, wiping it on his trousers and examining it critically. ‘He’s asking her to forgive him for his various foolish words and deeds. He’s apologising to her for his impatience, for his lack of faith and hope, for his obstinacy, doggedness. For his sulking and posing; which are unworthy of a man. He’s apologising to her for things he didn’t understand and for things he hadn’t wanted to understand—’ ‘That’s the falsest lie!’ said Ciri, straightening up and tossing the fringe away from her forehead with a sudden movement. ‘You’re making it all up!’ ‘He’s apologising for things he’s only now understood,’ said Dandelion, staring at the sky, and he began to speak with the rhythm of a balladeer. ‘For what he’d like to understand, but is afraid he won’t have time for… And for what he will never understand. He’s apologising and asking for forgiveness… Hmm, hmm… Meaning, conscience, destiny? Everything’s so bloody banal…’ ‘That’s not true!’ Ciri stamped. ‘Geralt isn’t saying anything like that! He’s not even speaking. I saw for myself. He’s standing with her and saying nothing…’ ‘That’s the role of poetry, Ciri. To say what others cannot utter.’ ‘It’s a stupid role. And you’re making everything up!’ ‘That is also the role of poetry. Hey, I hear some raised voices coming from the pond. Have a quick look, and see what’s happening there.’ ‘Geralt,’ said Ciri, putting her eye once more to the hole in the wall, ‘is standing with his head bowed. And Yennefer’s yelling at him. She’s screaming and waving her arms. Oh dear… What can it mean?’ ‘It’s childishly simple.’ Dandelion stared at the clouds scudding across the sky. ‘Now she’s saying sorry to him.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, The Time of Contempt

“We know each other,” he agreed. “They say that you follow in my steps.”
“I go my own way. But you, you had never, until just now, looked behind you. You turned back today for the first time.”
Geralt remained silent. Tired, he had nothing to say. “How... How will it happen?” he asked her at last, coldly and without emotion. “I will take you by the hand,” she replied, looking him straight in the eye. “I will take you by the hand and lead you across the meadow, through a cold and wet fog.” “And after? What is there beyond the fog?” “Nothing,” she replied, smiling. “After that, there is nothing.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski

“You can't stop a soldier from being frightened but you can give him motivation to help him overcome that fear. I have no such motivation. I can't have. I'm a witcher: an artificially created mutant. I kill monsters for money. I defend children when their parents pay me to. If Nilfgaardian parents pay me, I'll defend Nilfgaardian children. And even if the world lies in ruin - which does not seem likely to me - I'll carry on killing monsters in the ruins of this world until some monster kills me. That is my fate, my reason, my life and my attitude to the world. And it is not what I chose. It was chosen for me.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Krew elfów

“And why not?' the merchant replied seriously. 'Why not have doubts? It's nothing but a human and good thing'.

'What?'

'Doubt. Only an evil man, master Geralt, is without it. And no one escapes his destiny'.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski

“Remember,” she repeated, “magic is Chaos, Art and Science. It is a curse, a blessing and progress. It all depends on who uses magic, how they use it, and to what purpose. And magic is everywhere. All around us. Easily accessible.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Blood of Elves

“Then, four years later I received news from Aridea. She’d tracked down the little one, who was living in Mahakam with seven gnomes whom she’d managed to convince it was more profitable to rob merchants on the roads than to pollute their lungs with dust from the mines.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, The Last Wish

“Make use of the opportunity to have a bath yourself. I can not only guess the age and breed of your horse, but also its color, by the smell.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, The Last Wish

“A most deplorable sight," she said, folding her arms across her chest. "Someone who has lost everything. You know, minstrel, it is interesting. Once, I thought it was impossible to lose everything, that something always remains. Always. Even in times of contempt, when naivety is capable of backfiring in the cruellest way, one cannot lose everything. But he... he lost several pints of blood, the ability to walk properly, partial use of his left hand, his witcher's sword, the woman he loves, the daughter he had gained by a miracle, his faith... Well, I thought, he must have been left with something. But I was wrong. He has nothing now. Not even a razor."
Dandelion remained silent. The dryad did not move.
"I asked if you had a hand in this," she began a moment later. "But I think there was no need. It's obvious you had a hand in it. It's obvious you are his friend. And if someone has friends, and he loses everything in spite of that, it's obvious the friends are to blame. For what they did, or for what they didn't do.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Czas pogardy

“I thought I was choosing the lesser evil. I chose the lesser evil. Lesser evil! I’m Geralt! Witcher…I’m the Butcher of Blaviken—”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, The Last Wish

“Do you want to break Roach’s back?’ ‘Is it Roach? Roach was a bay, and she’s a chestnut.’ ‘All of my horses are called Roach.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Sword of Destiny

“Life, it turns out, isn’t poetry! And do you know why? Because it’s so resistant to criticism!”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Baptism of Fire

“Listen, Geralt—"

"No. You won't win me over with your reasons nor convince me that Eltibad wasn't a murdering madman, so let's get back to the monster threatening you. You'd better understand that, after the introduction you've given me, I don't like the story. But I'll hear you out."

"Without interrupting with spiteful comments?"

"That I can't promise.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Анджей Сапковский, The Last Wish

“We know little about love. Love is like a pear. A pear is sweet and has a distinct shape. Try to define the shape of a pear.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Анджей Сапковский

“Since when did you know anything about mimicking bird calls, Zoltan?’ ‘That’s the whole point. If you hear a strange, unrecognisable sound, you’ll know it’s me.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Baptism of Fire

“My choice...I'll tell you, Phillipa, what I've chosen. I won't allow you to involve Ciri in your dirty machinations. I am warning you. Whoever dares harm Ciri will end up like those four lying there. I won't swear an oath. I have nothing by which to swear. I simply warn you. You accused me of being a bad guardian, that I don't know how to protect the child. I will protect her. As best I can. I will kill. I will kill mercilessly...”
― Andrzej Sapkowski

“And so,' smiled the Witcher, 'I have no choice? I have to enter into a pact with you, a pact which should someday become the subject of a painting, and become a sorcerer? Give me a break. I know a little about the theory of heredity. My father, as I discovered with no little difficulty, was a wanderer, a churl, a troublemaker and a swashbuckler. My genes on the spear side may be dominant over the genes on the distaff side. The fact that I can swash a buckler pretty well seems to confirm that.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Czas pogardy

“Women don't have a say in my house. But, just between us, don't do what you did during supper last time in front of her again.” “You mean when I threw my fork at that rat?” “No. I mean when you hit it, even in the dark.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, The Last Wish

“Now you’re lying, Dandelion.’ ‘Not lying, just embellishing, and there’s a difference.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Sword of Destiny

“Yes, we are corpses. But you are death. Ciri”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Time of Contempt

“It may turn out,’ said the white-haired man a moment later, ‘that their comrades or cronies may ask what befell these evil men. Tell them the Wolf bit them. The White Wolf. And add that they should keep glancing over their shoulders. One day they’ll look back and see the Wolf.’ When,”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, The Time of Contempt

“Don’t mention it,’ the sorcerer patted the neck of his horse, which had been scared by all the yelling from Yarpen and his dwarves. ‘To me, Witcher, calling killing a vocation is loathsome, low and nonsensical. Our world is in equilibrium. The annihilation, the killing, of any creatures that inhabit this world upsets that equilibrium. And a lack of equilibrium brings closer extinction; extinction and the end of the world as we know it.’ ‘A druidic theory,’ Geralt pronounced. ‘I know it. An old hierophant expounded it to me once, back in Rivia. Two days after our conversation he was torn apart by wererats. It was impossible to prove any upset in equilibrium.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Sword of Destiny

“Říká se, že pokrok zahání temnotu. Ale vždycky budou stíny. A vždycky se bude ve stínech skrývat zlo, vždycky v nich budou zuby a drápy, vražda a krev. Vždycky budou tvorové tlukoucí po nocích. A my zaklínači jsme tady proto, abychom je ztloukli.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Sezon burz

“The king loved his wife, the queen, without limit, and she loved him with all her heart. Something like that could only end in disaster.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Анджей Сапковский

“People," Geralt turned his head, "like to invent monsters and monstrosities. Then they seem less monstrous themselves. When they get blind-drunk, cheat, steal, beat their wives, starve an old woman, when they kill a trapped fox with an axe or riddle the last existing unicorn with arrows, they like to think that the Bane entering cottages at daybreak is more monstrous than they are. They feel better then. They find it easier to live.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, The Last Wish

“Lesser, greater, middling, it's all the same. Proportions are negotiated, boundaries blurred. I'm not a pious hermit, I haven't done only good in my life. But if I'm to choose between one evil and another, then I prefer not to choose at all.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, The Last Wish

“I manage because I have to. Because I've no other way out. Because I've overcome the vanity and pride of being different, I've understood that they are a pitiful defense against being different. Because I've understood that the sun shines differently when something changes. The sun shines differently, but it will continue to shine, and jumping at it with a hoe isn't going to do anything.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, The Last Wish

“Only death can finish the fight, everything else only interrupts the fighting.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski

“Mistakes,’ he said with effort, ‘are also important to me. I don’t cross them out of my life, or memory. And I never blame others for them.”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, Blood of Elves